Love that!! It's so true and something I think I need to keep reminding myself. It is a journey. I know I have come a long way but I also find it's a "take 1 step forward, 3 steps back" kinda thing.

thirdtimemomma

02-07-2013 07:35 AM

Well written..

badmisterkitty

02-07-2013 09:45 AM

Re: Why simple is hard (article)

YES! I'm deep in the throes of un-junking our house. The "hoarding room," as my husband so affectionately calls it, is starting to overflow into another room. The garage sale isn't until May. So it has to stay until then....

Sidenote, but thought it might be relavant to the conversation - I decluttered toys. For serious this time. I was skeptical that simply limiting the number of toys would cure all ills. Even when I was done and looking at it, I still wasn't sure if I'd pared back enough or too much. I still figured I'd be picking up toys every evening for 15 minutes.

Boy, was I wrong. Their play is so much different, they are playing with toys they haven't played with in months, they haven't once asked for any of the toys that are put away, them seem to "cherish" the toys more than usual, and even if stuff is scattered around, it's considerably less and takes just 5-10 minutes and not even every day.

Anyhow, all that said, I'm completely sold on movingn forward in my minimalism journey.

elizabeth.scalf

02-07-2013 11:39 AM

I just got around to returning some Christmas toys to Walmart. All the extra junky ones that I immediately set aside. As I opened the bag they were in I thought, 'oh,, one shape sorter toy wouldn't be bad.'

NO NO NO NO NO NO. it would be very bad. We already have 2. It just struck me as silly that I won't ever be able to escape that mentality of moremoremore.

As a side note I got $40 credit that I bought groceries with. Thanks, aunts and uncles.

Lanolin

02-07-2013 12:10 PM

Re: Why simple is hard (article)

inspiring! back to the grind..it will be so worth it

leadmare

02-07-2013 04:43 PM

Re: Why simple is hard (article)

Thank you for sharing.

SarasynFox

02-07-2013 07:15 PM

Re: Why simple is hard (article)

That was kind of awesome, and so true! It isn't an easy process to feel comfortable doing something that's so against the mainstream American way. It can be especially hard when you have kids that are bombarded with advertising for products that sound great or are surrounded by friends' toys that are so cool that they would love to have them too, so they bug, or nag for them. It's definitely not easy.

And as I say that I've got half my master bathroom taken over by things to give away that I'm waiting to list on Freecycle until we've collected all of it so once it's gone, it's gone and we never have to look at any of it again. It's a lot more effort than I thought it would be.